


causality

by oryx



Category: Kamen Rider 555
Genre: Gen, Groundhog Day, M/M, Time Loop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-28
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-19 03:14:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2372474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oryx/pseuds/oryx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kiba gets to try again. (And again. And again.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	causality

**Author's Note:**

> always wanted to write this trope, and who better to try it out on than my dear kiba, who could really use a do-over or two.  
> (sadly, it ended up being a _bit_ of a hot mess [MASSIVE UNDERSTATEMENT], but points for effort, right?)

He wakes up with tears in his eyes, and it takes him a moment to remember why.  
   
 _Maybe it was all a dream,_ says a small, tired voice in the back of his mind, but he doesn’t really believe it. He’s had dreams like that before, after all – dreams where he’s frozen in place, and all he can do is watch helplessly as the people he’s meant to protect are killed one by one in front of him.  
   
His memories of yesterday are nothing like those nightmares. They’re so much sharper, so much _real_ er, each event flowing into the next in the way dreams rarely do. He can remember everything he did leading up to the meeting with Inui. The errands he ran, the people he saw on the street. He can remember the stinging pain of the bullets when they were ambushed, and the sheer horror in Inui’s eyes when Yuuji accused him of setting them up.  
   
He can remember exactly how Yuka’s ashes felt beneath his fingertips.  
   
Something twists painfully inside him, and he lunges for his phone on the bedside table. His hands are shaking as he flips it open and selects Yuka’s number, steeling himself for the sound of her voicemail message. He has to hear her voice. It will only make it hurt more, he knows, but he has to do it all the same, as confirmation of his failure. He let her down. He let her die. Just a kid, really, a highschooler, and he was supposed to keep her safe but he didn’t, he –  
   
“…Kiba-san?”  
   
His breath catches in his throat.  
   
“Is something wrong?” Yuka asks. She sounds half-asleep, words punctuated by a yawn, and he glances over at the clock. 7:52 in the morning. “Don’t tell me… Is Kaidou-san in trouble??”  
   
For a moment he sits there in stunned, uncertain silence, trying and failing to form a coherent thought.  
   
“… No,” he manages to say, and his voice comes out choked and thin. He swallows hard. “No, no one’s in trouble. I just – I don’t… Are _you_ alright, Osada-san?”  
   
“Me? I’m fine, why?”  
   
“No reason,” he says quickly. “I just… I woke up feeling worried, for some reason. Didn’t get enough sleep, probably.” He laughs, and even to his own ears it sounds forced. “Sorry to bother you so early in the morning.”  
   
“Oh no,” Yuka says. “It’s alright, Kiba-san! It’s a good thing you woke me up, actually. I didn’t want to sleep in too late today.” There’s a faint smile in her voice. “It’s… an important day, after all.”  
   
Yuuji’s skin begins to prickle. He can feel his initial shock fading away gradually into wary unease.  
   
“Your date?” he says, and Yuka laughs, nervous and awkward.  
   
“Yeah… Inui-san must have told you about it, then? I’m a little worried that I might mess something up. I’ve… never been on a date before.”  
   
Despite everything that’s impossibly _wrong_ with this conversation, Yuuji can’t deny the deep-seated impulse to encourage anyone and everyone around him.  
   
“It’ll be fine,” he says, and it seems, in this moment, like he’s addressing himself as well. ( _It will be fine. Either you’re going insane or the world is, but either way **it will all be fine**._ ) “Don’t worry so much, Osada-san. He likes you for you, doesn’t he? So just be yourself.”  
   
“…Yeah,” Yuka says, soft and hopeful and _happy_. “Yeah, you’re right.”  
   
He doesn’t remember the rest of the conversation. The next thing he knows he’s out of bed, standing in front of the television and watching the morning news, which opens with a story about a late-night mugging in Ikebukuro. A story he remembers hearing, down to the most minute detail, and the faces of the suspects all seem hauntingly familiar. The correspondent smiles as she introduces some brighter news. He remembers her pink blouse, and the gleam of her silver bracelet, and the way she stumbles over the word ‘legislature.’  
   
His eyes are drawn to the time and date in the corner of the screen. 8:05 in the morning. October 14th.  
   
Yesterday was October 14th as well.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
There’s no point questioning how he got here. That’s what he decides, after several minutes of panic have come and gone. Stranger things have happened, haven’t they? If he can return from the dead, if he can become something more than human, then why should _this_ be so impossible?  
   
(Instead of questioning it, he thinks, he might as well take the gift that’s been given.)  
   
He wastes the day away waiting for Inui’s call – pacing the apartment, flipping through books without really reading them, making himself tea that he’s too on-edge to drink. When the call finally comes he answers on the first ring, and Inui seems taken aback by the suddenness, clearing his throat to regain his composure.  
   
“There’s, uh… There’s something I need to talk to you about,” he says. “Face to face, I mean. You think you could meet me?”  
   
“Sure,” Yuuji says, his voice sounding far calmer than he is, pulse pounding overloud in his ears. “How about the hill behind the park?”  
   
Another startled pause. “Uh… yeah. Yeah, that’s where I was going to – ” He breaks off, making a small, baffled noise, and Yuuji can picture him shaking his head. “I’m… gonna ask Osada to come, too. She should probably hear this, since she’s the one they – ”  
   
“No,” Yuuji says, cutting him off, and he can’t quite disguise his own desperation.  
   
“… No?”  
   
“I don’t want Yuka involved any longer. She’s finally getting to live like a normal person, finally found someone to make her happy, and I just… I think it’s best if she gets as far away as possible from all of – all of _this_. She’s been through enough already. Whatever it is you have to say… I don’t think she needs to know it.”  
   
“But – ”  
   
“ _Please_ , Inui-kun,” he begs. “This is the only favor I’ll ever ask you.”  
   
Seconds tick by in silence. He can hear Inui breathing, and can imagine his expression – conflicted, hesitating, caught somewhere between his fairness and his trust.  
   
“Alright,” he says finally. “Just you and me, then.”  
   
Yuuji’s hand curls at his side, fingers digging painfully into his thigh.  
   
“Yeah,” he says, through gritted teeth. “Just you and me.”  
   
.  
   
.  
   
“I talked to them,” Inui says. “Those people from the government.”  
   
His words are slightly different than they were yesterday – more casual and straight to the point, with less caution in his voice. With Yuka absent, there’s no need for him to smooth away his sharper edges.  
   
“They said that it’s all a misunderstanding. They were just scared, I think. Of what they didn’t understand. But they get it, now. They get that we’re not all monsters. They said… that they want to try and coexist.”  
   
“And you believe them?” Yuuji says coolly.  
   
“… I don’t know,” Inui admits. His eyes meet Yuuji’s, and they stay that way for a quiet moment, locked in a meaningful stare. “I want to. I want them to prove me right – prove that they’re worth protecting. I…”  
   
 _I don’t want you to change._ This time around the words hang unspoken in the air, but Yuuji can still hear them all the same, can still feel their weight as they settle at the back of his mind.  
   
“Worth protecting?” Yuuji echoes, and laughs softly. “The same humans who followed you here? Who have us surrounded right now, their guns trained on our backs?” He shakes his head. “I don’t think so, Inui-kun.”  
   
Inui stares at him. “What? Why would – ”  
   
“You have Orphenoch senses, don’t you? Use them. Listen.”  
   
He hesitates visibly, but in the end does as instructed, closing his eyes and focusing, reaching outward for the faint sounds of heartbeats and rustling grass, the creak of fingers poised on triggers. By the time his eyes open again, his face has gone pale.  
   
“They murdered her,” Yuuji says. His voice is beginning to shake; he can feel the rage coming back to him, a dull roar in his ears. “I wasn’t careful enough. I let my guard down, let the humans get too close, and they killed her without a second thought. I won’t allow the same thing to happen again. Not today, not ever.”  
   
“Kiba,” Inui is saying, but his voice sounds strangely far away. “Kiba, what are you – ”  
   
“It’s just simple logic, Takumi. Kill or be killed. That’s all it is.”  
   
The roar in his ears is growing louder, now. His senses are sharpening, and yet he feels detached from himself, an onlooker observing from a distance.  
   
“That’s all it is,” he whispers, and loses himself to the transformation.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
The ashes are everywhere – in the air, and beneath the plates of his armor, and bitter on his tongue. The grass around him has been turned a dusty grey.  
   
There’s something holding him in place: Inui in his Orphenoch form, claws tight around Yuuji’s wrists, his stance low and tense like a wild animal backed into a corner. His breathing is ragged. He shifts back slowly into his human form, a tentative gesture of peace, but still does not let go of Yuuji’s wrists.  
   
“Kiba,” he murmurs, and his eyes are wide with dismay. “Please, just… _stop_. They’re all gone. You, you _killed_ – ”  
   
He breaks off, voice catching as he looks down at his feet, at the thin layer of ash he’s standing in. His hands are beginning to tremble.  
   
“They’re not _all_ gone,” Yuuji says. He peers around Inui, at the human cowering on the ground behind him, and can feel disgust roiling like a sickness in the pit of his stomach.  
   
“What?” Inui says, panic flickering across his face. “No, that’s – he’s surrendered! He put down his weapon, see? He’s unarmed. There’s no danger from him anymore, alright? Let’s just – ”  
   
“For us, Inui-kun, humans are nothing _but_ danger. Soon enough… you’ll realize it, too. I’m just doing what has to be done.”  
   
He pushes Inui out of the way with one hand.  
   
He steps forward and lifts his sword with the other.  
   
And when Inui throws himself back in his path, with the intention of taking the blow for the human, Yuuji realizes his error just a second too late.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
He wakes up with tears in his eyes, and it takes him a moment to remember why.  
   
It takes him a moment to remember kneeling on that hill with Inui’s ashes sifting between his fingers, trying frantically to piece him back together again.  
   
 _No_ , he thinks, as his hands twist the bedsheets into knots. _No, it can’t go like this_. Somehow, some way, he had been given another opportunity to save Yuka’s life. Another opportunity to get things right. But instead, he’d…  
   
(Inui’s expression had been more _sad_ than anything, in the moment before he turned to dust. But not, it had seemed, for himself.)  
   
Yuuji presses a hand to his mouth. There’s a sob threatening to wrench its way out of his throat, and he chokes it back, pushing himself up slowly into a sitting position.  
   
 _Maybe,_ he thinks, reaching inside himself for that faint spark of hope. _Maybe today is like yesterday. Another repeat._  
   
 _Another chance._  
   
He paces the room restlessly until the morning news comes on, and when it does he finds himself holding his breath. Ikebukuro. Mugging. Silver bracelet. ‘Legislature.’ Again. Again it’s all the same, and he falls to his knees from the sheer relief, his legs gone weak beneath him.  
   
October 14th, reads the date in the corner of the screen.  
   
Attempt number three.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
It takes everything in his power not to hug Inui when he sees him. ( _Please forgive me,_ he wants to say, but he fights that urge as well.) He settles instead for a casual clap on the shoulder that maybe lingers just a second too long, and Inui looks him in the eye curiously, like he’s struggling to read the true feelings there.  
   
He says it aloud, though, a few minutes later. “I don’t want you to change.”  
   
Yuuji counts that as a victory.  
   
This time around, he doesn’t allow his anger to blind him. He keeps himself aware, keeps the rage simmering low, and when he launches his attack each strike is as precise and biting as the edge of a knife. The humans that surrender he allows to live. It pains him to watch them flee, knowing what they could do (knowing what they _did_ ), but it’s far better than the possible alternative.  
   
Inui still tries desperately to reason with him. Still looks at him in horror when it’s over and done, reaching up with a shaking hand to brush ashes from his hair.  
   
But he’ll come to understand, in time. Even a soft-hearted person like him can only spend so long defending ungrateful monsters.  
   
 _It’s finished,_ Yuuji thinks, with a tight-lipped smile. The day is drawing to a close, the sun setting over the city skyline, and both Inui and Yuka are alive and well. Tomorrow he will wake up and it will be October 15 th, and perhaps the real fight will begin then, but at least for now all the people he cares about are safe.  
   
And that is when Inui’s cell phone begins to ring.  
   
He answers it robotically, still half in shock, not even bothering to say ‘hello’ as he lifts it his ear.  
   
“T-Takkun,” says the panicked voice on the other end of the line. Yuuji doesn’t intend to eavesdrop, but the heightened senses of his Orpenoch form are still lingering. “Takkun, please, I need help, it’s Yuka-san, she – she’s hurt really badly and I – ” He breaks off with a strangled sob, and it takes him a moment to collect himself. “It was the Lucky Clover woman… She just came out of nowhere and Yuka couldn’t transform and, and I just… don’t know what to do…”  
   
Inui turns slowly to look at Yuuji, eyes wide, knuckles white around his phone, and Yuuji can feel that faint sense of triumph fade away as quick as it came.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
They get there too late.  
   
Kikuchi Keitarou is slumped against the wall of the darkened alleyway, head in his hands, ashes scattered at his feet. He keeps whispering her name, like that will somehow bring her back.  
   
Yuuji stares down at him and feels nothing at all.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
He wakes up.  
   
He knows immediately that it’s October 14th again, by the smell of the air and the muffled sounds of early-morning traffic from outside his window. October 14th has developed an identity of its own, it seems, a personality, and he wonders if he might snap and start talking to it soon. The temptation to scream _let me out_ is already very much there.  
   
He should feel relieved, to be back here again. To have been given yet another chance.  
   
Instead, all he really feels is tired.  
   
Kageyama killed Yuka. Maybe the first time, too, judging by the way she had sought her out. Maybe it was never the humans who took her life, and for the past two days Yuuji has been blindly seeking revenge against the wrong target.  
   
They hurt her. That much is undeniably true. Exploited her weaknesses, strapped her to a table and experimented on her, like she was a lab rat instead of a person. But if they didn’t kill her… then was it really justice? The way he slaughtered them without mercy two times over? He remembers the sensation of his sword piercing skin and feels, suddenly, like he’s going to be ill. It had seemed so _right_ at the time.  
   
Now, he’s no longer sure of anything at all.  
   
He spends the morning and the afternoon just going through the motions, each action a part of the routine that October 14th has become. When Inui calls he barely listens, rattling off the appropriate words and phrases like he’s reading from a script. Yes. No. Don’t involve Yuka. Please, Inui-kun. It’s the only favor I’ll ever ask. (As far as you know.)  
   
“…Alright,” Inui says. “Just you and me. I’ll see you there?”  
   
Yuuji agrees and mutters a distracted goodbye, part of him still stuck back on that hill, still replaying each death (each _murder_ ) over and over again in his mind.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
He follows Yuka and Kikuchi on their date.  
   
When he sees her from afar, smiling and laughing like she never has with him and Kaidou, the reality of it all hits him like a slap in the face. Yesterday this girl died. Yesterday, while he killed “honorably” in her name, she had been bleeding out fast on the pavement. He’d laugh, if it weren’t so sad. Has he always been this ineffectual? Have his choices always been so meaningless? Living the same day four times over has shown him nothing but his own futility.  
   
Kageyama makes her move in that very same alleyway, a seemingly-harmless shortcut between the two main streets. She steps out in front of Yuka and Kikuchi with a smirk curving her lips, transforming in the blink of an eye, her Orphenoch form seeming to grow taller as she advances on them, blade held at the ready. They stumble backwards in their panic, both of them trying to shield the other, and it is then that Yuuji intervenes.  
   
“K-Kiba-san?” Yuka gasps, as he places himself squarely in Kageyama’s path. “What are you – ”  
   
“I’ll take care of this,” he calls over his shoulder. “Please, Osada-san, you need to get out of here.”  
   
She opens her mouth as if to argue, but seems to think better of it at the last moment. She’s undoubtedly felt the distance from her Orphenoch self growing as of late; felt herself returning to the fragile human weakness she used to know. Maybe she tried to ignore it, tried to convince herself that nothing had changed, but now, with a real threat in front of her, she’s smart enough to put the pieces together.  
   
“Be careful, Kiba-san,” she says, and tugs on Kikuchi’s arm, pulling him away. “Thank you.”  
   
“I should’ve known you’d interfere,” Kageyama sighs, as the sound of their footsteps fade into the background noise of the city. “You just never get tired of playing guardian to your wayward little flock, do you?”  
   
On any day before this one, he might not have been a match for Kageyama.  
   
Anger, he’s found, is an excellent motivator.  
   
But when it comes time for the final blow – Kageyama with her back to the wall, defenses down, all her earlier confidence replaced with apprehension – something inside him just… stops. His sword veers left, slicing at her arm instead of her heart, and he can taste bile on the back of his tongue. It’s the same, he thinks. The same desire for revenge he’d felt with those humans, but he’d been so blind then. What about now? Is there something he’s not seeing? Is this really what’s right? He sinks to his knees slowly, feeling like he’s being crushed by some terrible weight. Each shallow breath burns his throat.  
   
By the time he finally returns to himself, Kageyama is gone and his cellphone is ringing.  
   
“Ah, sorry to bother you,” Sonoda Mari says, nervousness tingeing her voice. “But… is Takumi with you, by any chance? He left a couple hours ago, saying he had to talk to you, but he’s not home yet. He usually calls if he’s going to be out late…”  
   
 _Just you and me. I’ll see you there?_  
   
He’d been so preoccupied with Yuka that he hadn’t even thought about it.  
   
Inui, waiting alone on that hill. The humans, accepting the failure of their plan, deciding that one Orphenoch captive was enough for today.  
   
 _I’ll see you there?_  
   
Yuuji’s bare knuckles connect with the brick wall, pain blossoming up his arm, as he tries desperately not to scream.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
On the fifth day, everything goes right.  
   
He warns Inui first thing in the morning – tells him to stay away from those people, to cancel his meeting with them, to watch his back whenever he’s alone and vulnerable.  
   
“Just trust me on this,” he pleads, and Inui reluctantly, sadly agrees.  
   
He follows Yuka again, and this time, with the edge of his blade pressed against Kageyama’s throat, he closes his eyes and does what he should have done before.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
He wakes up to October 14th, and contemplates going back to sleep.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
He asks Inui to meet him at the shrine. He’s so tired of the apartment, of that dark downtown alleyway, of that fucking hill. He needs somewhere _different_ – somewhere with at least one good memory to its name. But so much has changed since he was last here, he thinks, as he brushes aside fallen leaves and lowers himself down on to the stone steps. Even the calm of this place can’t totally set him at ease.  
   
Inui arrives a few minutes later, taking a seat next to him without a word. The collar of his jacket is turned up against the October wind, and Yuuji realizes, then, that he left the apartment without his coat. A sudden gust cuts through him, sending a shiver down his spine, and he wraps his arms a little tighter around himself.  
   
“You cold?” Inui asks, trying to sound unconcerned, and Yuuji finds himself smiling for the first time in a while.  
   
“Not really,” he lies. Then adds, truthfully: “It’s a welcome change.”  
   
Inui raises an eyebrow. But a second later he nods, as if he somehow understands the significance behind those words.  
   
“Do you believe in time travel?” Yuuji asks, the question spilling out before he can think twice about it.  
   
This time, Inui simply blinks at him. “Time travel,” he echoes.  
   
“Yeah.”  
   
Inui opens his mouth and closes it again. He rubs at the back of his neck, frowning thoughtfully, and finally says: “I guess anything’s possible, all things considered.”  
   
Yuuji nods. “That was my thought, too. I can’t properly explain it, but… I’ve been repeating this day – October 14th – over and over again. This, right now? This is the sixth time I’ve lived it. Probably not the last, with my luck.” He laughs wearily.  
   
But Inui, strangely enough, is nowhere near laughter. His eyes are narrowed, mouth set in a thin, worried line. “Oi, you… you sure you’re not hallucinating or something?”  
   
“Hah. I wish,” Yuuji murmurs, and can feel his forced smile falter. “It’s been a little too real. You were supposed to meet with those humans today, weren’t you? Instead of coming here? They would’ve lied, you know. They would’ve told you they wanted peace, and then tailed you in secret. They would’ve ambushed us – you, me, and Yuka.” He pauses; runs a hand through his hair with a sigh. “But that probably sounds insane to you, doesn’t it?”  
   
“… No, not really,” Inui says, after a moment of contemplation. “You wouldn’t make something like that up.”  
   
Yuuji looks over at him, then, at the sincerity of his expression, and feels a bit like crying. “You’re too nice a person, Inui-kun,” he says softly. “I used to think it was a flaw of yours. But maybe it isn’t. Maybe, if I were more like you…” He trails off. Everything would’ve turned out differently, if he were more like Inui. If he could forgive so easily. If he could see the potential for good in everyone.  
   
“That’s… Dunno what you’re talking about,” Inui mutters, averting his eyes. “You’re way better than me.”  
   
The tips of his ears are red.  
   
Yuuji stares, feeling strangely warm despite the chill, and wishes that tomorrow could really be tomorrow. (He knows that it won’t.)  
   
“Maybe,” Inui says. “Maybe there’s something special you have to do, to make it all stop?”  
   
Yuuji nods slowly. “Probably,” he says. “I just… don’t know what it could be. I thought I’d finally managed to fix every mistake. But maybe fixing isn’t enough.”  
   
(Later, he kills Kageyama for the second time, more out of obligation than any kind of righteous fury. She smiles as she dies, smug and oddly satisfied, and all the fear in her eyes that he remembers from before has been replaced with mockery.)  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
On day seven they meet on the path along the riverbank. They sit on a rickety old bench covered in yellowed leaves and sun shadows, and Yuuji explains it all again.  
   
“She’s died twice now,” he says, and Takumi looks at him sharply. “Maybe three times, for all I know. At this point I know how to stop it, and I _have_ , but… for some reason I’m still stuck.”  
   
“…‘She’?” Takumi says, a wary edge to his voice, the line of his jaw set with tension.  
   
“Yuka, I mean,” Yuuji says, and it’s rather cute how predictable Takumi’s reaction is: relief, followed by visible disgust at himself for daring to be relieved.  
   
 _Don’t worry about it,_ he wants to say. _I know how much Sonoda Mari means to you._  
   
But the words get caught in his throat.  
   
Strange, he thinks, how he’d forgotten about Sonoda Mari. Forgotten all those times they talked, and that day they spent together at the amusement park, and the way she used to get flustered whenever he smiled at her.  
   
Just a few days (a few _repeats_ ) ago, he had been prepared to condemn the entire human race, to write them all off as cruel and remorseless. But Sonoda – Takumi’s most important friend, his family, even – is also human, isn’t she? And Kikuchi as well, the only one capable of making Yuka truly smile.  
   
And Chie. Chie had been human, too.  
   
Hours later he once again finds himself in that alley, Kageyama backed against the wall, the edge of his sword hovering just above her neck. It’s all routine at this point, says a voice in the back of his mind. Kill her. Tick another box off the checklist of October 14th. But instead he simply stops. He lowers his weapon and takes a step back, and she sneers at him as she reverts to her human form.  
   
“I expected better from you, Kiba-kun,” she says. “Can you really afford to let me live? Isn’t that girl important to you? You realize I might come back for her. Tomorrow, even. Or the day after that.”  
   
Yuuji can’t help laugh as he turns away – a bitter, sardonic sound.  
   
“Yeah,” he says quietly. “You will.”  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
On the eighth day he begins to wonder if he’s been mistaken.  
   
Maybe there was never anything for him to do here, never anything to fix or change. Maybe the point of him being trapped here is merely that. A prison. A cage made of eternally-looping time, so that he’ll never get the chance to wake up on October 15th.  
   
Maybe, on October 15th, he does something truly, irreversibly disastrous.  
   
In that case, he supposes, there’s really only way to end this.  
   
“If I asked you to kill me… Would you?”  
   
Takumi stares at him from across the table, brow furrowing in confusion. The park is fairly quiet today, what with the brisk autumn weather beginning to set in, but he can still hear the faint sounds of children shouting in the distance.  
   
“If I said it was important,” he continues. “If it was in everyone’s best interest. Would you kill me?”  
   
Takumi’s expression seems to close off, then, like a door slamming shut, his eyes gone all cold and flinty. “You’re serious?” he says.  
   
Yuuji hesitates before nodding. It’s not as if he wants to die. Things have changed, since the day he threw himself off that roof and prayed for a quick and merciful end. Nowadays, he can easily count at least three reasons to stay. But this endless October 14th has to mean something, doesn’t it? If the universe is treating him like a glitch, like an error in the system, then who is he to disagree? Who is he to –  
   
“You promised,” Takumi says. “You swore you’d take me out if I lost sight of myself. But you didn’t.” _You couldn’t._  
   
“That’s not – this is different.”  
   
Takumi scowls at him, bringing his fist down on the table with a muffled ‘thump.’ “Maybe it is,” he says. “I dunno what the hell you’re on about, so I can’t really say. But… You’re smart, right? Smarter than me, at least. There has to be another way. Maybe you should look for it, instead of asking me to… to _kill_ …”  
   
He trails off and hurriedly glances away, taking a deep, shuddering breath.  
   
They sit in silence for a time, until Yuuji smiles wistfully and says: “I’m sorry. Just getting a bit desperate, I guess. Maybe it’s a good thing… that you won’t remember this tomorrow.”  
   
He gets to his feet and walks away before Takumi has a chance to ask.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
Again, he spares Kageyama’s life.  
   
“What is this, _mercy_?” she laughs. “Come on now, Kiba-kun. I never took you for a weak-hearted fool.”  
   
Her words give him pause. He stops for a moment and considers them.  
   
How odd, he thinks. Despite all that’s happened, today he doesn’t feel weak in the slightest.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
On the ninth day, he asks a question that he already knows the answer to.  
   
“Why do you fight so hard for humans?” he says, as his bat connects with the ball, sending it flying into the far fence with a clang. “They’d lock us up if they could, you know. They’d rather see us dead than living free.”  
   
Out of the corner of his eye he can see Takumi nod thoughtfully. “Some of them would,” he says. “But not all of them.”  
   
Yuuji finds himself smiling. “Your friends at the cleaner’s are a very rare exception.”  
   
“… Maybe,” Takumi says with a shrug. “Maybe not. You and me… We’re not human. Neither are Lucky Clover, but we’re not the same as them, right? We don’t want the same things. And Kusaka – he’s got a belt just like I do. He’s protected a lot of people, but he’s also the biggest asshole I’ve ever met.” Takumi grimaces, hitting the next ball with extra force, as if releasing some pent-up aggressions. “And Mari’s still convinced that Sawada is gonna come around. He _killed_ her and she still believes in him. Which means I do, too.”  
   
He lowers his bat slowly, and glances over at Yuuji through the bars of the cage. “I guess there must be people out there who see everything in black and white,” he says. “I’m just... betting on all the ones that don’t.”  
   
Outside the batting cages Takumi seems to hesitate.  
   
“Is something up?” he asks. He folds and unfolds his arms like he's not sure what to do with them, finally settling on jamming his hands in his pants pockets. “You’ve been acting kinda weird lately. But today you seem… I dunno. Weird in a different way.”  
   
Yuuji laughs. “A lot of stuff has happened. I’ll stop being weird soon, I swear.”  
   
Takumi frowns but nods anyhow, as accepting as ever of his cryptic excuses. He begins to reach for his helmet and his coat, and without thinking Yuuji moves to stop him, catching him by the wrist. They stare at one another in surprise, and Yuuji knows he should let go, but his hand refuses to comply. He can feel Takumi’s pulse beneath his fingertips.  
   
“I,” he says. “I don’t…”  
   
But words seem to be failing him, and so he simply steps forward and wraps an arm around Takumi’s shoulders. Takumi goes very still. He always struck Yuuji as the type who’d be bad at hugs, and he proves this theory quite soundly now, putting an awkward hand on the small of Yuuji’s back. Yuuji ducks his head and smiles against the crook of his neck.  
   
“Thank you,” he says.  
   
“… For what?”  
   
Yuuji ponders this.  
   
“For everything, I suppose,” he says finally, and holds on a little tighter.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
Yuka and Keitarou’s faces fall in unison when he advises them to cancel their date.  
   
“It’s just not worth the risk,” he explains. “I’m sure you can reschedule for another day, can’t you?”  
   
“…Or,” Mari says. “We could just… do it here?”  
   
They all turn to stare at her, and she blinks back at them from over top a pile of just-folded laundry. “What?” she mutters. “It’s a reasonable suggestion! If you can’t go out, then just have a date night at home. We could make this place look pretty nice if we tried.”  
   
Which is how he and a resentful Takumi get suckered into rearranging the furniture for a solid hour, afterwards assisting Mari with the colourful, mismatched decorations (scraps left over from a variety of holidays, it would seem).  
   
And which is also how they find themselves sequestered in the tiny guest bedroom, Mari spying on the date night goings-on through a crack in the door.  
   
“Oi, stop being creepy,” Takumi mutters, and she turns to glare at him.  
   
“After all the work we put in, I think I have the right to keep tabs on what’s happening. That’s entirely my culinary handiwork, you know. You’re no help at all when it comes to cooking.”  
   
Takumi simply glowers at her, apparently unable to refute her claim.  
   
“Sorry,” he says, lowering his voice so that only Yuuji can hear. They’re sitting side by side, backs against the wall, and every time Takumi shifts restlessly his knee bumps against Yuuji’s own. “For getting you dragged into this. You could’ve just left, y’know.”  
   
“No,” Yuuji says. “It’s fine. This is… a nice change of pace. To put it lightly.”  
   
Takumi raises an eyebrow, and looks like he’s about to ask why, but is interrupted by a quiet gasp from Mari.  
   
“I can’t believe it,” she whispers. “They’re holding hands! And here I thought he’d never make a move…”  
   
A minute later, when Takumi reaches over surreptitiously to grab his hand, Yuuji barely manages to bite back his startled laughter, smiling as he threads their fingers together.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
.  
   
He wakes up, and hears someone say “good morning.”


End file.
